RhondaBrwn said:
I found the viewpoint and wisdom of a group of military historians and wargamers to be an exceptional online resource when commenting and debating contemporary geo-political, military, and even social topics.
And there is some truth to the statement that warfare is bound up at the root level with politics (
von Clausewitz comes to mind). Are the politics and policies of Nazi Germany and Churchill's Britain relevant to a discussion of some topics on WWII? Yes, and the place to find those is in the WWII forum. Did the policies of the Confederate states have a direct effect on the eventual outcome of the American Civil War? Surely, and the best place to find these in-depth discussions is in the Civil War forum.
This was unique to this club and gave it great value beyond being a grognard resource for hardcore gamers who want to argue over armor penetration tables and so forth.
True, but the vast majority of these in-depth discussions that hold any real value will be found in the respective sub-forums dedicated to each war. Those that releate to tactics or overall military strategy belong in the Combat University folder.
Somehow, though, I come away from all of this with a sense that such political commentary and discussion was viewed as a distraction and somehow not really appropriate for the site. The fact that posting thoughtful and intellectual essays about current issues of the day count for nothing, while posting a "hey dudes, waddya think about the new "Gun Dog" demo?" gets you points, rank, and the adulation of your peers.
A distorted perception in my view. As I said above, political discussions that directly relate to a specific war and are intrinsically bound together within the larger context of the conflict are best found in the appropriate war forum.
At a meat and potatoes level, WHQ is about wargames. The discussions within the various wargame forums are just as serious and in-depth as anything found elsewhere on the site. Dismissing all the content there as "hey dudes, waddya think about the new "Gun Dog" demo?" is a bit harsh. And there is more to it than a few diehards arguing over armor penetration values.
. . . gets you points, rank, and the adulation of your peers.
I would beg to differ on that. I don't think many members put much stock in the rank system that is displayed beside each member's username. We simply did that to give visitors a quick visual reference as to how active and how often a given member posts. It doesn't mean they are a "senior member" or enjoy any privileges over the rest of the general membership. In some cases it is simply and indication of a very active participant who other members respect (because of his/her posts, not the rank), in other cases it simply indicates the member is a blabbermouth.
We did consider doing away with the current rank system altogether for a couple of reasons.
First, a very small number of people complained that they thought it was disrespectful to real soldiers who earned their rank. Our thinking was that a number of wargames assign rank or awards in this way right within the user interface of the game so we thought it was harmless enough. We could just as easily have switched back to the old system where everyone was a "Regular Member" or "Veteran Member" etc. The ranks add some flavor, nothing more. If they prove to be a hindrance I will remove them completely.
Second, we were concerned that people would get confused as to what these ranks mean vs. the ranks that members have on the W.A.R.S. system. Now those ranks
do mean something as the members worked very hard to achieve their status. We didn't want people to say, "why am I a Brigadier General on W.A.R.S. and a Sergeant on the forum?" So far people seem to have sorted that part out, but we may yet change it if need be.
As to the argument that deleting old posts would require posting counts to disappear... well, I would assume that each member record should have a counter that is augmented by each new post, and not a dynamic number generated by recounting the forums every time some logs on... if that's what your doing, it seems like a horrible waste of computing power. Update the counter and start pruning the deadwood out of the forums (all of the forums) without messing with anyone's rank.
Each member does have a counter which does not generate any additional server overhead. However, we do run the forum maintenance tools from time to time and those will automatically reset a member's post count total to what it really is, not what they
think it is. If a thread is deleted all the people who posted in that thread will still get credit for those posts unless the update tool is run. They would then be reset to their true total. The same is true if a member elects to delete one of their own posts.
Some people lost a very small number of posts when the
Officer's Lounge and
Locked Threads forums were disbanded. People who are complaining about losing hundreds of posts are those people who post very often in this particular sub-forum. And as I stated earlier, there are folders for all types of specific discussions on war, strategy, tactics, military history and wargaming. So what does that leave for this forum? Chit-chat and posts which are not the main content of either ACG or WHQ. Believe me, I have been doing this long enough and I have been on enough similar forums to know what happens when a FFZ is allowed to run in whatever direction it tends to go. No matter how noble the intentions, eventually the trolls will flock to such a place and when there are enough of them they will drive away the serious posters who don't want to put up with their comments. Sub-forums of this nature inexorably degenerate into flame pits and a breeding ground for all sorts of content that has no business on a site dedicated to either military history or wargames.
We are providing a place where members can chit-chat with other members about whatever, however, we have tweaked the software in such a way as to gently remind people of exactly which forum they are in. We are not trying to discourage people from posting here, but these posts will simply not count toward total post count. A very minor point that should not affect the vast majority of users in any significant way.
All that being said, this forum has a purpose and we intend to see that it meets that purpose. There are thousands and thousands of forums and chat rooms available that have no purpose whatsoever besides giving people a forum to event their frustrations and opinions. This is not one of them. I am fully aware that a small and vocal group of people will object to any attempt of any kind to organize, focus, or otherwise regulate how this forum operates. That's fine, but the vast majority of the members appreciate that we are doing our best to create a place that has some quality content, not just 2,000,000 posts.
It has all been really discouraging to me to be perfectly honest and sadly, it has diminished my overall respect for the club and it's value.
It will take everyone some time to get used to the new format. Some will not like it and decide to go elsewhere. That's a risk we took when we elected to merge the sites. We're confident that this merge has actually increased the overall value of the forum, not diminished it.
